How Many Men Won't Walk Away? Wedge Antilles
by Rhys
Summary: Rogues die fast, they always have. Wedge Antilles draws the sad duty of sending death notices to family and friends for the dead. Completed


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How Many Men Won't Walk Away?

_-Wedge Antilles_

_{Wedge Antilles, leader of Rogue Squadron, sat in his office, staring out the viewport at cold, black, empty space, without really seeing it. Why did he need to look at it, after all, when the exact same thing was mirrored in his heart? Wedge stood, eyes burning, heart broken so much he didn't even feel it. Although he longed to grieve, he could not. He wasn't even sad; just empty. Where there should have been grief, instead, he could only feel…nothing. Empty. So cold, so empty, so black and bleak…dead. Just like his comrades. Dead, all dead. And he could feel nothing. Slowly, stiffly, moving like a man over twice his twenty-some years, Wedge sat down. He faced a blank datapad on an empty, makeshift desk. He also faced something he couldn't bear to do: the notifications of their deaths. Those that still had family, or friends they wanted told, those that had kept any ties to their past; enough that the Alliance could notify someone…someone had to be told they were dead. And Wedge, as their commander, had to do it. He slowly reached out and pulled the datapad in towards him, and began…}_

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How many men

Won't walk away

From this cold and bloody war?

How many men

Will fall each day

In this cold and bloody war?

Why do they fight,

Why do they fall?

Why do they try at all?

Falling and failing they go

To a cold and early grave.

Falling and failing they go

Each in their own separate ways.

How many men must die?

How many more can there be?

Day after day 

After year after year,

Nothing is changing but they—

They lie in their graves,

Frozen and fried,

All that remains is the death!

Nothingness, 

Empty and cold

Is all that they fight for and in.

Nothingness, 

Empty and cold

Is all that remains, within!

How many men

Won't walk away

From this cold and bloody war?

How many men 

Will fall each day

In this cold and bloody war?

Why do they fight,

Why do they fall?

Why do they try at all?

Falling in failings

And dying in trailings,

Falling to death one by one!

How quickly they go,

And how cruelly they die

Killed by those darker than space!

Killed by those colder than space…

How many men

Won't walk away

From this cold and bloody war?

How many men

Will fall each day

In this cold and bloody war?

How do they fight,

And how do they fall?

How do they try at all?

Seeing their comrades meet Death,

Quickly and harshly to fall!

How do they fight, 

Why do they fight?

How in Sith do they fall?

Quickly and cruelly,

Coldly and fully,

Falling and dying they go!

And the killing grounds 

So fast become

Seas of red and gray!

Yet seeing this all

Still more do they come

Fighting on

Day after day!

How many men

Won't walk away

From this cold and bloody war?

How many men

Will fall each day

In this cold and bloody war?

How do they fight,

And how do they fall?

Why did they live at all?

Why

Did they 

Live

At 

All…?

__

{Tycho Celchu, Rogue and friend to Wedge Antilles, walked into the office, and saw his commander sitting, staring at his hands, at the datapad in them, sitting as one whose heart was torn out of him—the sight he'd expected to see. Wes Janson, down in the Med Bay undergoing Bacta Therapy, couldn't do the duty; he, in his cheery optimism, was most fit and usually drew it. Derek Klivian, known as Hobbie, was far too dour and pessimistic to cheer Wedge up when he got in this mood—and so the task went to Tycho, who forced his own grief and guilt aside as he walked through the door. Words for pep talks had run through his head as he walked the halls to Wedge's office, but they all flew out right away when he crossed into the office. They were trite, and that wasn't what Wedge needed, not what would help. Tycho, his own heart broken even more brutally, more completely, than Wedge's was, with the destruction of his home planet of Alderaan, knew what grief was, knew what guilt was. But that wouldn't help Wedge unless Tycho could find the right words. He hoped, with all his heart, that he'd be able too.}

"Wedge. It's me, Tycho."

"Why, Tycho? Why?" _{Wedge's voice was a hoarse whisper}_ "Why did they all have to die—_how_ did they die? All of them…all killed; floating, free hydrogen in the void of space; the cold, black emptiness that's their grave. How did they _all _die? And yet, I'm here, and I have to do this, now…

"Sithspit, I can't even grieve for them. How am I supposed to help their friends and family through their grief if I can't even feel anything? They were my friends—were, there's that verb again. Past tense. Why do I always end up using past tense when I talk about the Rogues? They never last long enough for me to talk about them in the present—all I can do is talk about the past. How do they all die, so quickly? Yet, they became my friends. All of them; each and every one. 

"I can't believe they're dead—gone. Just snuffed out, so quickly, so soon… Out in a blaze that wasn't even glory. How did they all end up staying there, staying out in the cold void? Why don't they ever fly away with me? How many more will stay, joining their fellows in space, in death? How many won't fly away? How many more will I loose to this bloody war? I can't even remember why I joined the Rebellion; why did they? Did they ever think, really think, that they might never leave it? That they might be nothing more but another name on the list of those the Empire killed; that by trying to destroy it they were destroyed? That in trying to kill the Empire, they were killed themselves?

"They were young, so young. Not in years, but in age. I'm older then they ever were; older than my years. I could see my childhood in their eyes, but I lost that so fast, so soon, so early. They didn't; right up to when they died. Were any of them truly prepared? They all saw the romanticism, that which calls to youth, and all joined as youths. So young; with that eternal youthfulness. They weren't prepared at all; they thought they could never be the one to fall that day. But they did. They all fell, one after another.

"Will anyone survive this bloody war? Will the others here? Will the Empire? Will I? Will the galaxy? Will we? How can we, when in order to do so we all have to die as well? 

"And if we do all have to die as well? What will rise up to take out place? Will we take the Empire with us, or will we just be a spot in an endless history written by the victors—by the Empire?

"Will there even _be _a victor? Or will we just wipe each other out, leaving anarchy? Or will we _bring _anarchy? Sending the whole galaxy into one big war, where we all kill each other? Will it matter? Aren't we all dead anyway? All those brave people, now nothing more than a few scattered atoms in the void of space? Or were they brave? Maybe we're the cowardly ones; we're afraid to live. We are afraid. But of what? Which scares us more—the living, or the dying? Or is it neither? Or maybe both…

"How many more fights can we even fight, before we're dead, all gone and dead? Slaughtered, vaped, killed, dead. In this war, this bloody, never-ending war. How many times into the fray, how many Rogues won't fly away? Are we dead already, walking dead—flying dead. Flying dead through hell. How many more lost in this war? I can't even remember what I'm fighting for! And now there's nothing left. 

"Nothing, not even grief. The stars are black and cold, and as I stare into my heart, I see the void reflected there. Has, in their death, each friend taken a part of my heart away, and now I'm left with emptiness—as dead as they are. Only I still walk, but can I fight? Can you fight if you're dead—if you're nothing but an empty void?

"Cold. Black. Frozen. Dead.

"The Rebellion's dead.

"They're dead.

"I'm dead."

__

{Tycho Celchu then did a very uncharacteristic thing—he walked over to Wedge, spun his commander around to face him, and slapped him—hard—across the face.}

"What the—"

"Stop it. Right now, Wedge." _{Tycho glared, his eyes steely glints, at the surprised Wedge Antilles} _"Stop feeling sorry for yourself. You shouldn't, and you can't. You're not dead; you just selfishly _wish_ you were. But you're not, which is, trust me, the better way of it. You're being a selfish pig and you know it. The other members of the squadron are in Down Time now, and they're all just as sad about seeing friends die as you are. Take Plourr, how do you think she feels?"

"Madder than anything, and wanting another—"

"_No_." _{Tycho's voice was cold enough to freeze carbonite} _"She isn't. She's sad, is what she is. Too tough, of course, to show it, but we can tell. Or Hobbie: he's _truly_ pessimistic now, not just his usual dour self. Aril, Wes, any of them, they're all sad. But do they feel _sorry_ for themselves? Are they sitting around cursing the universe and cursing their own _lives_? No! They're mourning _together_, _helping_ each other get through it. And now, if you're going to be such a jerk, why not just walk over to the Empire, announce yourself, and have done with it? If you're going to be like this, then walk away. Go ahead: leave. Get out. Do you hear me, Wedge? Do you understand what I'm saying? I'll repeat it, slowly, and I want you to remember it for the rest of your life: _You are being a selfish jerk and don't deserve life if you hold it in such contempt_!"

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{For a moment that seemed to stretch into eternity, both men were silent. Then, slowly, as Tycho's words sunk in, Wedge Antilles seemed to live again, his eyes lit with their customary glow. He quirked his mouth into half of a small, sad smile, and put a hand on Tycho's shoulder} 

"You're right, probably more so than I know right now, and thank you. Now, before I break the Corellian unwritten law and cry, let's say we head to Down Time. After all, we have some Imperials to pay back and some good friends to toast."

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{Tycho smiled as well, and together the two men went out, arm and arm, towards the future; one which could end far ahead or painfully soon. It didn't matter; they would go to it together with their friends, hoping they might live to see the dream which had awakened the call for Justice in their hearts become a truth, but knowing that they were helping that dream become reality; if not for them, than for someone else, someone who deserved the Freedom and Justice they fought so bravely for…

{Behind them, the untouched datapad timed out and blanked itself, purging it's memory of the sad, empty words recently typed upon it, efficiently clearing the slate and cleaning the past…

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May the Force be with you.


End file.
